1. What is your specific view on what happened at the site in Jurmala. Is it just an isolated event, or a symptom of a larger problem?

The fire in Jurmala was an exceptionally tragic case. It has had a very negative impact on human health and environment and media have dedicated much attention to this specific incident. However, we cannot speak of it as of an isolated phenomenon, because huge amounts of waste are collected in Latvia for recycling are not processed in reality. 23 000 thousand tons of waste stored in Jurmala is a clear sign that the recycling processes are paralysed for some reason. In addition, recycling enterprises usually officially declare very low business turnover and commercial losses. Considering the big amount of waste imported to Latvia, there is a clear mismatch between the real and the declared revenue of such companies.

3 Three Latvian waste-recycling enterprises (among them enterprises dealing with plastic, wood, cardboard, paper and glass) have recently got fines for a common sum of 39 Million Euro for not recycling the stored waste and for other irregularities. The companies reacted that the fines could not be paid, as they were in bankruptcy.

Other cases of fire have been registered after Jurmala incident. The fact that plastic is not a particularly inflammable material can make one think more of an arson than a simple fire. Should this be true, we are faced with a real ecological crime with international elements.

Current lack of control and underdeveloped legal norms put waste recycling into a grey zone of Latvian economy.
I am glad that today on December 7 Latvian Saeima adopted a new legislation that provides major control on waste traffic. But this is only one of the needed legislative steps, like enforcement of the prosecution of environmental crime and stricter assessment and control of real capacities of recycling enterprises. On the EU level, additional measures should be taken to better implement the Regulation on shipments of waste (EC) No 1013/2006(1) as amended in May 2014.

2. If there is a larger issue with waste from other European countries, such as Sweden, shipped to Latvia – what is his view on that problem?
In fact, the waste does not come only from Sweden, it also comes from Finland, the Netherlands, Germany and Austria.
Latvia is becoming a place of waste dumping, it represent a severe ecological challenge to us, and it results in hidden revenues and undeclared taxes.

3. What is your view on the responsibilities of the Swedish government and Swedish companies in regards to this issue?

Formally, Swedish government is not directly implicated into the ecological crimes happening in Latvia. But considering the strong value that Sweden gives to environmental protection I would encourage it to make a closer scrutiny of the contracts its companies sign with the Latvian recycling enterprises. It is rather suspicious when some company’s offers too low prices for the waste recycling compared to the prices in other European countries. The major factor of recycling price does not lie with the cost of labour, but with technological, operational and energy costs. Therefore it would be wrong saying that recycling in Latvia can be dramatically lower than in Sweden. Clearly, these advantageous prices could be result from such “cheap” approach we saw in Jurmala.

I would like however to highlight that ecological damage, like the one that occurred in Jurmala, always has a cross-border character. It is therefore in the interests of Sweden, and of the EU as a whole to give more visibility to the irregularities in Latvia.

4. Have you in any way communicated his view on these issues to the Swedish government or it’s representatives in the EU?

I did not get in contact with the Swedish Government on this issue, as I consider that it is necessary to clarify all the circumstances in Latvia first. We first need to guarantee the contractual rigour and make sure that Latvian recycling enterprises do not take on more contracts than they can actually comply with. It is also necessary to guarantee the verification of performance and make sure that the waste is recycled in due time.